An extraordinary expedition was announced recently at the Museum of Natural History in NYC. At the center of it all is the newly designed Exosuit, a robotic dream created by Nuytco Research, the latest generation of atmospheric diving systems which protects the pilot from the effects of high pressure. The Exosuit will work together with a unique remotely operated vehicle (ROV), a recently developed system designed with the support of the National Science Foundation, with specialized cameras that hope to capture images and video of bioluminescent and biofluorescent life forms in the very dark and deep ocean.

Exosuit and ROV on display at the American Museum of Natural History in New York (image by David Gruber)

The first expedition will focus specifically on the discovery of bioluminescent fishes and invertebrates. In order to study the behavior of these organisms, the team will combine the Exosuit and the DeepReef-ROV. David Gruber, John Sparks and Vicent Pierebone are the team responsible for the design and development of this state of the art ROV which has been outfitted with high-resolution cameras which will allow the researchers to image life in extremely low-light at the bottom of the ocean.

Bioluminescense took center stage at the monthly Science Cafe held at the American Museum of Natural History NYC (image by Fabio Esteban Amador).

It is the combination of the Exosuit and the ROV that puts this mission on the scientific and technological frontier. It truly is the ultimate interaction between man and robot placed in a very dark and deep inner-space. Although many future missions and applications are already part of our dreams, the present task is likely to help the researchers make remarkable achievements in capturing and identifying many new species, witnessing how they communicate love and war, as well as to understand the nature of bioluminescence and its future applications in medicine and brain research.

Michael Lombardi: the Exosuit pilot, will be wearing the Exosuit and will dropped in the ocean at a location one hundred miles of the coast of Rhode Island known as the canyon, where depths reach over ten thousand feet.

David Gruber: Marine Biologist and Associate Professor at Baruch College in New York City and Associate Researcher at the American Museum of Natural History.

John Sparks: Curator-in-Charge, Department of Ichthyology at the American Museum of Natural History.

Vincent Pieribone: Professor of Cellular and Molecular Physiology and of Neurobiology at Yale School of Medicine and Chief Scientist for the Stephen J. Barlow Bluewater Expedition.

The team is a perfect example of how collaborative efforts in scientific research are leading the way to the future. The use of the Exosuit and the ROV hope to provide new ways for scientists to observe, image, and collect marine life in areas that are dangerous and difficult to explore. The future is here and the ocean is the new frontier in exploration. We look forward to the expedition and to the discovery of a new world.

Comments

Greg

Bronx NY

October 23, 2014, 8:55 pm

What is the purpose of the suit since it is rated to 1000 feet and this canyon is around 10K feet, The ROV will do the deep work. I have done saturation diving to 1200 feet and I realize the suit keeps you at 1st atmosphere but I still don’t see the advantage of using the suit other than its cool.

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